I have several of the 1.44MB Gotek models with the 3-digit display. Out of the eight or so I have, one has failed so far. They screws they come with (IF they come with them; some of mine haven't) will seem at first glance to be too big for the holes, but they will fit with a little work. They don't always line up properly in cases either, so you may only use two of the holes to mount them. They do seem somewhat cheap with no much holding everything together, but they do work well in the PCs I've installed them in. That being said, I've never used a Tandy system so I can't offer any advice there.

I did a review a while ago: https://youtu.be/taFP1J_lZBI

I have three or four of them and they have been flawless. Can't recommend them highly enough.

I've been hesitant to use them purely for esthetic reasons. I think there ugly and destroy the classic look of a retro PC. I seem to be on the minority in that camp though as Ive seen a lot of retro PC guys using them. If I ever do use one it will be the Amiga version as it seems Amiga floppies have such a high rate of failure and most WHDload rips are PAL versions that run like their on crack on my NTSC machines.

I worked with real floppies many years ago, but the reliability simply was poor. Disks I created not too long ago would have read errors and things like that. I had all my disks organised, Sound Blaster installation disks for example or MS-DOS installation disk. But I kept running into reliability issues. The floppy emulator has been flawless and it's also very convenient. I keep the USB in a bag with a sheet of labels. That way I know which virtual floppy number holds what 😀

I agree with Phil on the reliability aspect. I chose function over looks in most cases - at least with the beige versions. I also have a spreadsheet detailing each 'virtual' floppy so I know what disks are associated with each slot.

hmmm, if only there was a way to hide it in the PC like in a 5 1/4 hdd caddy or something. I know its a lot of effort but the look is part of the immersion experience for me. one of those reasons I just don't use DOSbox for everything. are there any system limits for these? for example could I pop one of these in a 386 running DOS 5.0 or even an 8088 machine as a 720k floppy drive?

snorg wrote:

Are there any tricks to installing/using them? I have a Tandy so I imagine I'll need to mode the cables or something.

AFAIK, Gotek floppies don't support some protection tricks. If you intend to use unprotected games, you won't notice. If you're using booter images (that often have some kind of disk protection), you'd better choose an HxC.

The Gotek can't be beaten on cost, the cheapest HxC (slim) is about double the price.

However the HxC does a lot more. There's a DOS program for HxC that shows all the disk images on-screen and allows you to change between them on the fly, video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rfovFoMaL54

Few more advantages:

- Supports all PC formats, plus many other platforms and custom formats
- Can act as both drive A and B at the same time, with different images in each
- Has a support forum
- Really good build quality, made in the EU
- Can be easily hidden inside a PC case using cheap PCB mounts

Mmmm. Corona... 😀

How do these work? You just put an .IMZ file on a USB stick and the computer sees it as a floppy?

2fort5r wrote:

How do these work? You just put an .IMZ file on a USB stick and the computer sees it as a floppy?

A thumb drive is basically partitioned into lots of smaller 1.44MB virtual floppies - the number of floppies depends on the capacity of the thumb drive. An app lets you open each one up, write to it, and then close it up. The drives have little buttons that let you advance to the next floppy. You can write floppy images to these partitions or just drag and drop files/folders to them. Some are two-digit and others are 3-digit.

I would recommend at least getting 1, Mostly I like the look of old and new combination but like Soviet Conscript said My very 1st PC just didn't look right without a real floppy drive. I swapped the real drive for the Gotek while installing Dos/Win3x, after which files can be coped over the network and put the original drive back after as really how often do you use a floppy on a PC with a HDD?
The actual install was much quicker, not because of drive speed (it should be about the same) but just the fact you never get read errors anymore.

I'd probably get one if I felt I had more of a need but I still have so many 3 1/4 floppy disks and zip disks it's still not worth it to spoil the look of my machines for a slight convience which I'm not doubting there very convenient. As I said I may pick an Amiga version since it's not so easy to just rewrite amiga games to a floppy on the PC.

The creator of the HxC emulator is working on porting the HxC emulator firmware to the Gotek hardware. This will give the Gotek hardware some of the advantages of the HxC (e.g. the image selection software). I'm going to get hold of a Gotek to test it out.

bjt wrote:

The creator of the HxC emulator is working on porting the HxC emulator firmware to the Gotek hardware. This will give the Gotek hardware some of the advantages of the HxC (e.g. the image selection software). I'm going to get hold of a Gotek to test it out.

That would be awesome!

bjt wrote:

The Gotek can't be beaten on cost, the cheapest HxC (slim) is about double the price.

The HxC sounds interesting, but, at least from Australia, the cost is quite a bit higher. The Gotek can be had for A$25 shipped, the HxC sells for EUR 60, with shipping that will be closer to A$100 😵

Artex wrote:

bjt wrote:

The creator of the HxC emulator is working on porting the HxC emulator firmware to the Gotek hardware. This will give the Gotek hardware some of the advantages of the HxC (e.g. the image selection software). I'm going to get hold of a Gotek to test it out.

That would be awesome!

The tool to flash the firmware is already available actually. http://hxc2001.free.fr/floppy_drive_emulator/

I like the idea of floppy emulators. Drives and diskettes aren't going to be made forever, used and NOS units won't last either. It's just another way to keep old computers usable.

Hi guys,
checking for Gotek ( on ebay ) I found bunch of references. I went to Gotek website and didn't found any explanation on differences between all models... Are all Gotek compatible with PC ? Most of them are sold for Amiga, some for Yamaha keyboards...
I don't want to order the wrong model 🙁